In the 19th century, mercantile giants evolved into banks, because after expanding to the limits of their trading turf, that's how they'd get secure, predictable Return On Capital (ROC).
In the 20th century, industrial giants evolved into fintech services, because after expanding to the limits of their markets that's how they'd get ROC.
In the 21st century, the largest software companies seek to evolve into adtech for the same reason.
How is advertising synonymous with capitalism? If it were communism or socialism we'd likely just call advertising propaganda, but is there a real difference?
To be clear, even if Microsoft was born in a reality where America was Democratic Socialist, wouldn't they be doing the same thing just a slightly different purpose?
It's not absurd to envision a world in the next 30 years in which advertising is >33% of global GDP - and maybe 2-5 companies control >50% of that market.
like if i go to a grocery store and forget my wallet, then i can pay for it by watching 10 mins of ads or something...
Advertising pays for a lot, but it also doesn't pay that much.
You can never say if something is a bubble until after it pops.
On the other hand, I think there's a convincing argument that people are having more and more of their needs and basic wants met. And if you're in the business of selling things - you need to synthesize wants in your customers.
Only 200 years ago, basically everyone on the planet was a peasant. Only 70 years ago, even middle class people in the US and Europe had a laughably low standard of living by today's measures.
Now, in ~60% of the world (the developed world incl. China) - only a couple percent of the population is a dirt poor.
In many ways, it takes more effort to sell people a seventh computer than their first. In other ways, repeat customers are your easiest sales. Still, you usually need to market even to your repeats...
Still, in order to grow - you can't just sell your existing customers the same thing every year. You need to constantly sell them more...
That being said, there are tons of companies out there that are huge and do no advertising. Word of mouth, relevance to reality, and quality of product win out over the long term.
Have you heard about Mediaocean? They are an old adtech company. I have an interview with them but I don't really understand what they do.
It manages ad campaigns, audiences, billing and finances, workflows, optimization, comps, etc. It integrates with major ad platforms which run the actual ads, and collects performance data from APIs and reports, and puts it all together in a single place for analysis.
But even there, most people object to the personalized ads and the tech that measures it. People don't seem upset about ads in print magazines (that are tied only into the consumed content) or ads in podcasts.
Meaning what? This is technology to deliver advertising.
Where ads are placed has nothing to do with this story, and hasn't changed because of it.
Not sure why this thread has turned into so many off-topic complaints about Microsoft but this acquisition itself makes perfect sense. The duopoly of Google and Facebook has weakened with the changing landscape of mobile devices, tracking protection, and data regulation. Amazon is quickly building their ad business along with Apple and this gives Microsoft a solid leap forward to leverage their growing media inventory and onboard existing clients with a fully functioning demand and supply-side platform.